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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/24490591">In the End</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/delighted/pseuds/delighted'>delighted</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Hawaii Five-0 (2010)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Coda, Episode: s10e22 Aloha (Goodbye), M/M</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-06-03</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-06-03</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-04 04:35:48</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>6,641</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/24490591</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/delighted/pseuds/delighted</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Final episode coda. </p>
<p>
  <i>In the end, it’s all that matters.</i>
</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Steve McGarrett/Danny "Danno" Williams</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>24</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>260</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>In the End</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>I just let my feelings do what they needed. &lt;3</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>It’s been a while, since the last message. </p>
<p>
  <em> He’s getting restless. </em>
</p>
<p>Danny hadn’t dared hope that meant what he wanted it to, but lately, having not heard more from her, he’s been wondering. He’s actually holding his phone, working on a message he won’t send, when it buzzes.</p>
<p><em> Take care of him. </em> </p>
<p>And his breath halts. Midway between his lungs and his throat, just stops. He almost thinks he won’t breathe until... until what? Until Steve’s back under his own roof? Until Eddie’s wagged his tail off in his excitement? Until Danny’s finally, finally held him in his arms and <em> known</em>. </p>
<p>But he has no idea how long that’ll be. So he forces himself to breathe again. Sets the phone down, draft saved. Always saved, never sent. He calls for Eddie, knows he can’t sit still or he’ll crawl out of his skin, so he takes the dog for a walk. Or, more accurately, he lets Eddie take <em> him </em> for a walk. And maybe he gets a little lost, maybe he loses track of time—not that time has held much meaning for him these past few months. Marking time. Passing time. Killing time.... None of it has mattered, and yet it’s mattered more than anything. Because he’d known. For a long time, he’d known. </p>
<p>The only way to get Steve back had been to truly let him go. </p>
<p>And it wasn’t like it hadn’t broken his heart into a million tiny pieces. But it also wasn’t like his heart hadn’t already been completely fractured. Already been deformed and battered and bruised beyond all recognition. </p>
<p>It wasn’t like that at all. </p>
<p>Because it very much was that the day after Steve left on that plane, Danny set about rebuilding his heart, piece by piece. Shard by shard. Until he’d completely rebuilt it. Into something new, something different, something it never would have been—if not for the one thing he now knows is missing. The one thing he now is absolutely certain he needs. To breathe, to be, to live. </p>
<p>The one thing that is finally, finally, coming home.<br/><br/></p>
<p>The sun is low in the sky by the time they get back from their walk. He feeds Eddie, forgets to eat, himself. Sits on the sofa, rubs Eddie’s ears when that concerned muzzle rests on his leg, one soft whimper his only remaining concession to his former daily routine of moping. </p>
<p>Danny hadn’t moped. Maybe Eddie had done enough of that for the both of them. Or maybe Eddie was responding more to Danny’s feelings than his own. Danny never really had been sure. He had buried himself in healing. In recovery. In strengthening, after. In getting stronger. It started with the physical because that’s so much easier. But the thing is, there’s only so much you can work on physical recovery. So much of it has to be about rest. Only, your mind never wants as much rest as your healing body needs. Which means you have to find some way to occupy it. But binging old movies or neglected TV shows felt empty. And reading couldn’t capture him. So it was his own thoughts he’d fallen sway to. Which is how he’d ended up clearing the rubble of his long-broken heart and starting again. Which is how he’d finally figured out he was in love with Steve. And that Steve had been in love with him for ten fucking years. </p>
<p>Eventually Eddie tires of sitting with him and trots off to bed, one last concerned look back at Danny as he goes. It’s enough to guilt Danny into climbing up the stairs and hitting the shower, before falling, exhausted but hopeful, into a surprisingly deep and restful sleep.<br/><br/></p>
<p>He knows it before he’s fully awake. Steve’s there. In the room with him. Watching? Yeah, watching. Watching Danny sleep.</p>
<p>He opens his eyes, and sure enough. There, on the floor, back against the wall, slumped a little, yet posture taut, is Steve. Solidly, tangibly, beautifully real.</p>
<p>“Hey,” Danny says, trying to keep the smile out of his tone, because he doesn’t want to give all his cards away in the first round.</p>
<p>“Hey,” Steve replies. As though entire conversations happen with just those two words. And his voice sounds exactly the same, and somehow completely different. </p>
<p>Maybe because of the beard. As full, if not maybe a little fuller, than after his ill-fated Mexican adventure. </p>
<p>“When’d you get in?” Danny asks, looking at the clock at the side of the bed. Just past 3:00 am. Not many middle of the night flights land on Oahu, so probably Steve’s been sitting on the floor for a while. Which is when it occurs to Danny, maybe why Steve hadn’t just showered and gone to bed.</p>
<p>Steve shrugs. “A while ago,” he admits. </p>
<p>Maybe he’s waiting for Danny to explain. Thing is, Danny’s not really sure he’s ready for that. </p>
<p>“You see Eddie?” He asks instead, because it surprises him the over-protective canine isn’t plastered to Steve’s side.</p>
<p>Steve grins. At least, Danny thinks he does. It’s hard to tell in the dark, and under all that hair. “He crashed on the sofa,” he says. As though that explains everything. Which it does, because yeah, he’d have met Steve at the door, and not let him much further in the house before demanding probably the world’s longest belly rub. Months’ worth. </p>
<p>Danny chuckles. Still doesn’t move, to sit, to get out, get up... make room, even. Or at least explain. </p>
<p>Finally Steve caves. </p>
<p>“You’re in my bed.” </p>
<p>It’s a simple observation. And yet it’s not. </p>
<p>It’s not like there’s not two other beds in the house. Not like Junior hadn’t moved in with Tani ages ago. Not like Danny hadn’t been sleeping in the guest room anyway. </p>
<p>Thing is. He can’t really explain why he’d done it. Why he’d started sleeping in Steve’s room. In Steve’s bed. Doesn’t even really remember when it had happened. Just, at some point, it hadn’t seemed right to sleep anywhere else.</p>
<p>“Yeah,” Danny admits. “You gonna shower?”</p>
<p>Steve lets out a warm, low, rumble. “Okay.”</p>
<p>And he does. Maybe takes a bit longer than normal. Danny tries not to think about that. </p>
<p>Eventually he emerges. Wet, smelling like soap, like Steve. He goes to his dresser, lets the towel drop from his waist, tugs on briefs, nothing else. Stands looking at Danny. </p>
<p>“This how it is now?” He asks. Tone amused, maybe a little something else. Awe? Uncertainty? Relief?</p>
<p>“Mmm,” Danny replies. Scoots over, lifting the quilt. </p>
<p>Steve chuckles again. Climbs in, his weight shifting Danny’s body on the mattress. His weight shifting Danny’s whole world on its axis. Everything lifts, then resettles. And everything that’s been wrong. Everything that’s been on hold. Everything <em> rights</em>. </p>
<p>Danny closes his eyes. “Night babe,” he whispers. And if Steve guesses he’s said that every night Steve’s been gone, he does his best not to let on.</p>
<p>“Night, Danny,” comes the soft reply. And maybe that, too, sounds well-worn. <br/><br/></p>
<p>The sunlight is warm on Danny’s face. </p>
<p>What’s even warmer is the feeling in his chest, because he knows. Steve’s watching him again. Still? Had he slept at all? </p>
<p>His eyes open to familiar hazel ones. They look different like this. On the pillow next to his. </p>
<p>Steve’s smile is lazy, soft. Warm. Maybe a little something dangerous. Sly? Cunning. Fox-like. Predatory. Possessive? </p>
<p>Probably it’s always been like that. Maybe the beard just makes it more obvious.</p>
<p>Danny reaches a hand out. Touches it. </p>
<p>He hadn’t, last time. After Mexico. After Doris. Had only looked, thinking he had time to get used to it, but Steve had shaved it completely, that first morning home. And Danny’d been left wondering. </p>
<p>He’s not making that mistake again. </p>
<p>It’s soft. He hadn’t expected that. He can’t quite tell where it ends and where Steve begins, and he hadn’t expected that, either. Steve melts into the touch, and okay that he definitely didn’t expect.</p>
<p>“I like this,” Danny whispers. It feels dangerous to admit. He likes that, too.</p>
<p>“Yeah?” Steve mutters. Hazy, fuzzy, sleep softened, yet turning towards alert. Taking in new, pertinent information. “I was gonna shave it,” he admits. It’s almost a question.</p>
<p>“Not yet,” Danny replies. </p>
<p>It’s not an admission of anything substantial. And yet, it feels like exactly that. </p>
<p>“Okay,” Steve murmurs, pressing his cheek further into Danny’s hand, like it’s so much more. </p>
<p>They drift like that. Warm, dozy bubble of touches that mean more than they seem, but nothing more overt, till they’re interrupted by 80 pounds of adoring golden fur, determined not to be left out. </p>
<p>“I’ve missed you too, buddy,” Steve coos as he scratches him, and they’re words he’s not spoken to Danny, but he feels them just the same. </p>
<p>“You should swim,” Danny says, as he adds a hand to Eddie’s morning loves. If he thinks about the hand he’d like added to his own morning needs, well. </p>
<p>Steve’s eyes meet his, over the panting tumble of enthusiastic dog, and Danny sees it immediately. He’s not had anything guiding him for months now. No one telling him what to do, what not to do. And for about three seconds Danny almost panics. Almost thinks he’s messed everything up, Steve’s <em> liked </em> it, liked being free of Danny’s attempts to manage him, control his lesser demons. Catherine never tries. Danny knows. Knows she thinks it’s why she’s always failed him, failed <em> with </em> him. But maybe....</p>
<p>And then, the smile starts to form. And it’s familiar. So achingly familiar. It cuts like a blade through Danny’s mounting panic, and Steve reaches a hand out to Danny’s arm. </p>
<p>“Yeah, good idea. Thanks, Danny.”</p>
<p>And maybe it’s that. The hand, hot to the touch. Not a gesture Steve would ordinarily make, not a gesture he has made, not like this. Like he means something by it.</p>
<p>Danny knows he does.</p>
<p>“I’ll go make coffee,” Danny offers, but doesn’t move. Partly because, you know. And partly because Steve’s hand is still on his arm.</p>
<p>“No, let me,” Steve says, squeezing that hand, but still not taking it back. “Let me.”</p>
<p>Danny tries to smile, tries not to look down at his arm, until it’s all he can think about, all he can feel, all that exists in the world. Him. Steve. And that one point of contact. It’s too much and it’s not enough and it’s everything and it might still be nothing, and everything, everything hinges on it.</p>
<p>And that’s just too much for one touch to bear. Too much weight, too many expectations. It couldn’t possibly....</p>
<p>Steve finally lets go. “There is coffee, right?”</p>
<p>And that breaks Danny out of his haze, the words, more than the loss of touch. He chokes on his laugh. “Of course there’s coffee you moron. I’m still me.”</p>
<p>And maybe he regrets the word choice. Maybe there’s something there, some meaning he didn’t think he meant but that maybe he did, does. </p>
<p>
  <em> Yes, I’m in your bed, yes we’ve just slept together, but I am still the same Danny I was. </em>
</p>
<p>But the thing is. He isn’t.</p>
<p>Steve nods anyway, gives Eddie one last ruffle of the ears, pulls back the covers and stands. And it’s not like Danny’s looking on purpose. Not like he’s thought to himself, right, check the situation in his briefs, check the swell of his dick. As if somehow it’ll be instructive, and not just, you know, natural.</p>
<p>It feels instructive though. Both that he sees what he expected to, and that Steve maybe tries a little to hide it. Pulls on a tee, slips into shorts. And none of that really completely disguises the fact that he’s pretty damn hard. But then again, when it comes to it, they’ve spent enough nights in each other’s company over the years, it’s not like they’ve not been in the room with each other’s hardened dicks before.</p>
<p>It just feels a lot more meaningful this particular morning, is all.</p>
<p>Danny has time, while Steve and Eddie go downstairs to make coffee, and probably go outside to pee (the dog, that is, hopefully not the man, though there’s no telling just how feral Steve’s become in his time away, but probably even he wouldn’t be so... Neanderthal-ish). Point is, they’re gone for a bit, so Danny has time to brush his teeth, settle his nerves, settle various other things, and he’s scrolling through his phone when Steve returns—and it’s not till then he even thinks: was that weird? Had that even been what Steve had meant? It <em> had </em> been what Danny’d meant: <em> You stay in bed I’ll go get coffee and bring it to you. </em>But maybe Steve hadn’t?</p>
<p>But he settles easily back on the bed. Handing Danny a mug that’s perfectly full, perfectly hot, the perfect balance between coffee and milk, and how is it that coffee always tastes better when Steve makes it?</p>
<p>He probably should not indulge in the moan of pleasure he allows to escape his lips, but damn. You think you’re doing just fine on your own, coping remarkably well, even. Being injured, recovering, missing your best friend like a limb. Making coffee yourself, even though you’ve long since grown accustomed to him making it for you.</p>
<p>“God I’ve missed you.”</p>
<p>It’s a coda to the moan, and unfortunately it sounds like it. And probably he shouldn’t have said it. Because it’s a little weighted a comment at the moment. But maybe it’s easier if he means <em> because of the coffee. </em>Which to be fair he does. It’s just he means it fourteen other ways as well.</p>
<p>Steve chuckles, drinks his coffee, and doesn’t seem to find it weird at all.<br/><br/></p>
<p>He does swim. And Danny noodles around the house. Like he’s become accustomed to doing. </p>
<p>It’s a routine that’s of necessity different from how it’d been while Steve was there. Junior had moved out almost right away, partly Danny knows, because it was just too weird, them both missing him. In such very different ways. And it’s not like Danny wasn’t used to living on his own. But it had taken him a surprising amount of time to be able to find his footing, living alone in this house. This... meaningful, important, significant, life-altering house. He’d done it though. Him and Eddie. And maybe the two beings who missed Steve like they would miss their own shadows bonded in their time together. Maybe they even became a little co-dependent. It’s not like Danny hadn’t had that kind of “boy and his dog against the world” relationship before. But that was about paper routes and sneaking down to the shore and climbing out the bedroom window for illicit activities in the middle of the night and sleeping in the treehouse because sometimes you just need to be able to hear your own thoughts.</p>
<p>This was about realizing things about yourself as a man. As a partner. As a friend. As a lover. As a husband.</p>
<p>This wasn’t rebelling against the world, not in the teenage sense. But maybe it actually was about rebelling... against <em> himself. </em> Against who he’d tried, for ten long years, to be. Who he’d tried <em> not </em> to be. </p>
<p>Who he couldn’t not be any longer.</p>
<p>And, okay, maybe it had been a little dramatic of Steve, to run away like that. And maybe Danny’d been hurt by it, though he had, more than any of the others, understood. But maybe it had been just exactly what he himself had needed. Not to run away. But to be left. To be left and to survive it.</p>
<p>And maybe more to the point. Maybe Steve needed to be the one to do the leaving. Steve who had always been the one left. Steve who had been so hurt by that. By other people leaving. Leaving <em> him. </em>He needed to be the one to leave, and he needed to leave Danny. </p>
<p>So that they could both find themselves, without each other. So that they could find themselves <em> with </em> each other.</p>
<p>He’d realized it less than a week in.</p>
<p>Steve had been gone for more than three months after that. And in that time, Danny had decided a number of things. His house had been completed, for one. And he’d leased it. Found he could make good money running it as a vacation home. Really good money. Found too, he enjoys doing it.</p>
<p>He’d also found he doesn’t quite heal from injuries the way he had. There’d been a few rounds of testing. Just to be sure. But he’s fine, just... getting old. Maybe needing to be more careful about what he eats. A little more careful to not push so hard. Maybe take up a hobby. Relax a little. Which was all very fine and good, but the one thing he really wanted to take up had been half a world away.</p>
<p>Which is probably what had made the next decision all the easier.</p>
<p>He’d hung up his badge. Turned in his gun.</p>
<p>And the weight of that. It was... shocking. He’d thought the realization that he wanted to be with Steve was the biggest realization of his life. How could anything top that?</p>
<p>This had. Because you worry about it, alright? Especially something like being a cop, where your job isn’t just your job, it’s your life, it’s who you are, in every fiber of your being. It’s your identity, your family, your calling. And yeah, he had been terrified of how he’d feel, laying that mantle down. It had felt easy enough to do, having already laid down (or at least laid aside) his relationship with Steve. Still, he’d been terrified.</p>
<p>But as it turned out, not only had he not felt lost, not felt adrift, not felt... <em> bereft.... </em></p>
<p>He’d felt like he’d found himself again.</p>
<p>(He hadn’t really known he’d been lost in the first place.)</p>
<p>And at first it was little things. Like, he got up earlier, and what was that even about? But he awoke feeling refreshed, went to bed less than completely exhausted. And it took him a while to realize it was because he was sleeping so well. </p>
<p>(That had been before he moved to Steve’s bed, so don’t go getting all sassy and thinking that was why.)</p>
<p>Then it was things like realizing coaching Charlie’s Little League wasn’t just a fun father-son thing, but actually a life-fulfilling thing for him, and maybe he’d missed baseball a whole lot more than he’d ever allowed himself to feel.</p>
<p>There were other things. Like visiting Grace. Really, truly visiting. Being present for her, with her. She’d sensed it right away, even guessed it, before he’d told her—because of course he hadn’t made a big deal about leaving the Force. Though Duke had wanted to. “Maybe when Steve’s back,” Danny had said, and of course Duke had understood.</p>
<p>Grace had realized about that, as well.</p>
<p>“Please don’t tell me you haven’t figured it out by now,” she’d said one evening as they sat on the grass outside her dorm, eating amazing Thai take-out, drinking overly-sweet iced tea.</p>
<p>“Figured what out, Grace?” He’d tried to layer his tone with a note of warning. A hint of <em> I may be your cool retired old man but I am still your father. </em> She hadn’t been cowed.</p>
<p>She looked him straight in the eye, unblinking. “That you’re in love with him, and that he’s in love with you... has been, for ten years.”</p>
<p>He had the sense to not even try. He'd set his spicy peanut noodles down, picked up the creamy thick tea, drank till the caffeine and sugar flooded his bloodstream.</p>
<p>“Yeah. I know.”</p>
<p>She’d grinned. “Great, so what are you gonna do about it?”</p>
<p>He’d wanted to say, his instinct had been to say, <em> None of your damn business, </em> but the thing was. It kind of <em> was </em> her business. She’d been there for so much of it. Been there for him, for so much of it. Far more than a child should have needed to. Parented him just as much as he’d parented her. Done it with Steve as well. And been a daughter to Steve. Which had been more healing for both of them than either of them had ever realized.</p>
<p>And knee jerking to that old defensive habit, he knew, wasn’t who he was now. Not with his rebuilt heart.</p>
<p>Steve had had his fingers inside Danny’s chest in more ways than one throughout the past ten years. But it was Danny’s own rearranging that had finally done it, finally shifted his heart. Which of course was how it needed to be.</p>
<p>So he picked back up his chopsticks. Stole some of her <em> pad see ew </em> and talked completely openly with her about what he’d done, what he was doing, what he planned to do.</p>
<p>She hugged him so tightly that night when he walked her back to her door.</p>
<p>“I’m so proud of you Danno,” she’d whispered.</p>
<p>And really it’s the parents who are supposed to be proud of the kids, isn’t it? But the other way round ends up feeling so much more meaningful.</p>
<p>He’d laughed through his tears. “Yeah, me too Monkey. Me too.”<br/><br/></p>
<p>He’s sitting at the dining room table, looking over the batting order, the upcoming schedule, the scouting reports, yes, scouting reports, from the other teams. When Steve walks in, dripping and golden, glowing in a way Danny hasn’t seen on him in ages.</p>
<p>And maybe it’s that. Some euphoria from being back in his ocean, like it’s restored a part of him that had faded. Or maybe it’s the pull of Danny looking all professional at the table, papers spread before him. But Steve evidently can’t resist. He stoops over him, rubs that beard against Danny’s cheek, dripping water on Danny, on the papers, on the table.</p>
<p>“Whatcha got there, Danny?” He asks, standing back up to finish toweling off.</p>
<p>And he starts to react, starts to bristle. It’s habit, and it springs back so fast. But the thing is. He doesn’t want to scold Steve. It’s just water. Danny’s spilled far worse. Really he hopes no one ever notices the batting order’s got whiskey and chocolate ice cream on it. Or the practice schedule is smeared with mayonnaise.</p>
<p>So he pushes a chair out. Gestures to his analysis. Boasts a little about how he’s actually using his degree, thank you very much unending college debt. And how he’d always said he’d end up doing more with baseball.</p>
<p>And Steve’s impressed. Only. It’s less like he’s surprised, more like... like Danny’s only doing what Steve had known he was capable of all along. And maybe he does bristle a little at that, at not being more overtly praised. Because we always love to be praised, maybe especially when we’ve surprised ourselves. But maybe the bigger point is we don’t really need it, when we’ve finally stepped up to what we’ve been capable of being all along.</p>
<p>Steve does look very much like he wants to kiss Danny, though, sitting this close. And that’s a different matter all together.</p>
<p>They haven’t even hugged, he realizes.</p>
<p>But somehow, that’s okay. It’s not like it would be enough anyway. And maybe that’s the point. They can’t really hug when what they actually want is probably a lot closer to fucking each other’s brains out. But that’s jumping over a few key parts. So it’ll have to wait.</p>
<p>The kiss is a near thing though. He’s so close. So open. So focused on Danny.</p>
<p>Just like he used to be.</p>
<p>And the thing is, it’s really hard to take, being looked at like that. It’s next to impossible to comprehend, if you’re not used to being adored. Worshiped. It’s terrifyingly easy to dismiss it completely, because it's so overwhelming it’s almost as though your brain can’t even see it straight. So it twists it, makes it something it can understand, can tolerate, and you end up being snarky and bite-y and sassy for ten years before finally the shell breaks and you see that all along you just couldn’t take being <em> so loved. </em></p>
<p>He can take it now. And it’s an overwhelming kind of feeling. But the good kind. The kind that fills you up and pushes out your hurts, your wounds, your sense of failings, inadequacies. And leaves in their place this kind of soft, honeyed, pulsing vibrancy. Like you’re somehow more alive for it. Because of it. Like somehow nothing else matters, because you finally see.</p>
<p>And the thing is, Steve’s known. He’s seen—while Danny was sleeping, he thinks. And okay, Danny was sleeping in Steve’s bed, that has to have been a sign. Has to have meant something to him. Felt like a message. A telegraphing of intent. Because that’s just not something one does, unless one means something by it. So yes, probably Steve had known pretty much right away, that Danny’d finally—not seen, but <em> allowed, </em> it. But Danny gets the sense he’d known already. Almost... almost as if it had been why he’d come home. That he’d finally felt... it was time.</p>
<p>“I’ll go make breakfast,” Steve says, towel still around his neck, chest still fabulously bare. And maybe he’s needing to extricate himself before he forces the kiss he knows Danny won’t want till they’ve talked. Maybe he's treading carefully, afraid to push, afraid to <em> be too much. </em> And that’s a realization that hits Danny square in the chest, because he’s thought he’d been through it all, been through all the scenarios of how this might go, might finally go. But he somehow failed to anticipate this one key thing. This thing that feels so central, so essentially Steve.</p>
<p>He gets ahold of the towel, just as Steve’s half way to standing. And at first he just holds it, but it starts to slip, so he turns, and he grabs both ends, one in each hand, and he lowers Steve by it, firmly, slowly.  </p>
<p>But he still needs some words, so he compromises.</p>
<p>“Kiss me first. Then breakfast.”</p>
<p>The <em> Then talking </em> is implied.</p>
<p>“Okay,” Steve husks on an airless exhalation, and he leans down and closes his eyes, and... it’s more like he lets himself sink onto Danny’s lips like they’re land and he’s been at sea for too long. He doesn’t move so much as seem to be drawing life from the touch, and Danny gets that, he does, but he’s needed more for so long, and he’s not—for all he scolds Steve for being impatient, he’s just not very good at delayed gratification, so he bites softly at Steve’s lower lip, and that gets air into Steve’s lungs, which for a man who has been slowly drowning for ten years is probably a good thing, and before Danny can tell what’s happened, Steve’s lifted him, actually fucking lifted him, and is pressing him against his bare chest like he never thought he’d get the chance.</p>
<p>Once he’s set Danny down, his hands slide around to grip his ass, and pull him up and against his groin to point out he’s already completely hard thank you very much, and okay. Danny likes knowing that. Does not plan on doing anything about it here in the dining room thank you. Mayonnaise on the practice schedule and whiskey on the batting order is more than bad enough.</p>
<p>Besides. And it’s not even like it’s the talking that’s important. It’s far less tangible things than words that need time, space, air. Between them. Amongst them. Around, through. Their hearts need to align. Their bodies re-acclimatize. Pulses need to sync. Brains find their wave.</p>
<p>Really completely honestly, they should surf together before they fuck each other. Should eat together before they, well, eat together.</p>
<p>Steve’s actually the one to gentle Danny down from it, and that says a whole lot, he thinks. And he’s grateful, grateful it didn’t have to be him to slow things down. Because while there’s no question in his mind that sex with Steve <em> right now </em> would be beyond amazing, he knows, if they wait, it’ll be <em> life changing. </em></p>
<p>“I’m gonna make breakfast,” Steve restates, his tone heavy with intent. “Please tell me there are eggs.”</p>
<p>Danny smirks around the implication. Because yeah, there are. It’s just he doesn’t use them for breakfast. Well. Pancakes. And coffee cake. But mostly he uses them for carbonara, breading things, typical Italian stuff. Or egg wash for the breads he’s been baking in his new downtime. Breads he makes and leaves at his house for his clients. Which they rave about, thank you.</p>
<p>And maybe it’s dumb. But he hasn’t wanted eggs for breakfast unless it’s Steve making them.</p>
<p>“Bur—”</p>
<p>“Burn yours a little, yes I know, I haven’t been gone <em> that </em> long,” Steve sighs, and smacks Danny nicely on the ass as he heads for the kitchen.</p>
<p>Danny sits back down, mostly because he’s actually gone weak in the knees, and well, for him, that’s a problem in more ways than one. Damn injuries that never let us have our lives back. He lets himself have the one moment of wallowing self-pity and regret, then forces himself refocused on his spreadsheets. It helps when Steve brings him a fresh coffee, although it doesn’t help when Steve kisses him on the cheek, those bristly bits feeling like a comfort he’d never known he wanted.</p>
<p>“Thanks, babe,” he murmurs, half his focus still on the swirl of numbers before him. </p>
<p>It’d been, in a lot of ways, his first language. Stats. Keeping scorecards at Mets games, at Matty’s games. Teaching Bridget to keep his stats the way he likes best. Econ had grown out of that. A way to balance the loss of his playing career. It hadn’t helped, though. In many ways it had only made it worse. And okay. The turn to the Force was never completely free from a hint of self-punishment. That sense of <em> Well since I can’t do what I truly want, I can at least be of some use. </em>And that’s a dangerous trap right there isn’t it. The need to be of use. He’d had it entrenched in him from childhood by his grandparents. Of course they’d meant well by it. And it’s a concept he still holds dear. Not just because of their history leading them to value it—a Depression, a War. Rationing. Lack. Helping each other is how they survived. That need, to come together. To support each other, friends, loved ones, the community, the country. Danny loved the ideal of it as much as he felt fueled by the practicality of it. That it helped when everything else seemed to fall apart. But it’s not without its dangers, especially in someone already prone to sacrificing themselves.</p>
<p>Steve, of course, knows that, too.</p>
<p>And, in a way—maybe a very fitting way—it’s been a huge part of what’s kept them apart. And it’s been them both finding their selfish side, their <em> yes but now I need to do this for me </em> side... that’s brought them, finally, together.</p>
<p>Yeah, Danny thinks, that’s probably pretty damn fitting.</p>
<p>Steve burns Danny’s eggs the perfect amount, and it should be hard to admit he’s missed eggs, but it’s just not, and if Steve’s touched or amused that Danny’s been abstaining he doesn’t tease him for it, doesn’t gloat either.</p>
<p>It’s not just Danny who’s refitted his heart. And that fills his more than than he’d thought possible.<br/><br/></p>
<p>They take Eddie for a walk after. Danny’s indulged him, maybe too much, in Steve’s absence, but in fairness, he’d had to do what he’d had to do to keep the dog from falling into a pit of gloom. And Eddie’s enough like Steve in that regular exercise (and regular belly rubs, though less literal in Steve’s case) is absolutely essential. And, to be frank, though Danny would previously deny it, he knows. It’s true of him as well. Maybe in a slightly different sense. But true of him just as well.</p>
<p>They talk mostly surface stuff. Tani and Junior. Grace. Charlie. Steve’s visit with Mary and Joanie. Nothing of the deeper stuff. Nothing of Catherine. How much Steve knows—how much Catherine let him be aware she was keeping Danny informed—Danny doesn’t know. Cath never offered to tell him, and Danny never asked. Steve hasn’t mentioned it. Probably won’t. Danny’s not sure it matters anyway. He’s pretty sure Steve knows.</p>
<p>Thing is. It feels a lot like Steve knows a lot more than Danny’s ever given him credit for. Which is completely inaccurate. What’s a lot more accurate is that Danny’s given Steve a hard time for the things Danny’s had a hard time allowing. Steve’s seen Danny more clearly than Danny’s seen himself. For ten years. And Danny’s seen Steve right back. Steve’s just fought the knowing of it so much less. But he’d put Danny so much before himself, Danny’s needs before his own, and so he’d kept himself from ever asking. Which made it all the more ironic that just as Danny was nearly ready to do the asking, Steve had left.</p>
<p>He’s not sure what that does in terms of who should ask now. He’s not sure it matters.</p>
<p>They play fetch with Eddie in the yard after. Sit with beers in the sand. Grill some fish Steve found in the freezer. Eat salads and complain about missing French fries.</p>
<p>It’s early, but they’re tired. They lounge on the sofa, feet in each other's laps. Something’s on the TV, but they’re not watching. Eddie sleeps peacefully at their side. Content now that Steve’s home.</p>
<p>As is Danny.</p>
<p>Almost.</p>
<p>Steve’s got his phone on, he’s scrolling thru something, not really looking. Danny’s is sitting on the coffee table. Mostly so it’s out of his reach. He’s been itching to show Steve the drafts. At least, he thinks he has. Maybe it’s more that he’s been itching to figure out if he <em> should.  </em></p>
<p>He’s halfway down his usual rabbit hole, pro-and-conning himself into a tangle, when he feels a tap on his leg. Steve’s offering his phone to Danny. Attempting to stir him from his reverie by pressing his phone into Danny’s shin.</p>
<p>“Yes?” Danny asks, eyebrows up, holding himself back from adding something sassy like <em> Use your words please, Steven. </em></p>
<p>“Just look,” Steve insists, gesturing emphatically with his phone.</p>
<p>And. Well. Danny supposes that’s as good a sign as any, so he squirms more upright, ignoring Steve’s protests, to grab his phone off the table, and sees the understanding in Steve’s eyes as Danny resettles, holding his phone out in some kind of phone exchange equitability, takes Steve’s as he takes Danny’s.</p>
<p>“Drafts folder,” Danny says, when he’s met with Steve’s questioning look.</p>
<p>The sly grin isn’t concealed quickly enough to keep Danny from knowing Steve had guessed as much.</p>
<p>He’s just as sure his own expression conveys his surprise when he sees what Steve’s left open for him.</p>
<p>It’s photo albums. Dozens of them. Arranged not by date, not by theme, but haphazardly by some method only Steve can know. Danny clicks on first one, then another, scrolling rapidly through to gather the gist, before settling into a more thoughtful and observant viewing. And “thoughtful” absolutely is the fitting word, because yes there are some of the expected views—sunsets over distant purple mountaintops, city neon flickering on wet pavement, laughing children kicking a soccer ball, some sort of wooly goat clinging to a rock face (Danny doesn’t want to think about how Steve got that one). But there are... unexpected entries as well. Cups of coffee on balcony railings. Soft-looking pillows tossed against carved headboards. Half-finished plates of pasta, of cakes, of salads, curl-edged wine labels held close to flames to be read. More surprising are the selfies. Often with strangers, smiling widely and offering the peace sign, but sometimes alone, more thoughtful, somber. Beard growing ever longer as he scrolls on.</p>
<p>He looks up at Steve periodically, to see if he’s being watched, but either Steve’s faster than he is, or he’s just as absorbed by Danny’s offering as Danny is by Steve’s.</p>
<p>Which, okay, is gratifying. He’d written, not as he speaks, but as he writes. And there’s a rhythm to it, one you may forget but fall so easily back into. He’d written them <em> to </em> Steve in a sense. But he’d not written them <em> for </em> him. Danny’d written, every night, every morning, every day at some point, processing his life... without Grace, without Rachel, without <em> Steve... </em>without who Danny had become with them. To find who he was... alone. The fact that he’d been unable to want to tell that story to anyone but Steve.... Well, it had been not a revelation at all.</p>
<p>Danny looks up when he feels warm, solid, metal resting again on his leg.</p>
<p>“I kept wanting to share it with you,” Steve says softly, nodding at the phone in Danny’s hand, a foggy, blurry image of something green in the rain... a plant, bending under the weight of the dripping water, a light—a flashlight? A headlight? A bike’s light perhaps, backlighting the droplets, making them gleam like gold. “Everywhere we went. Strange places, familiar places. There’d be something that would just... it would <em> hurt </em> that I couldn’t share it with you. So I took those.”</p>
<p>Danny doesn’t say <em> You could have shared it with me, </em> and not because he doesn’t know if he means by going with him on the trip, because that was never the point, or if he means <em> You coulda sent them to me, could have called, </em> because that was also never the point. It was the opposite of the point. Which Steve knows, because he’s got those same words, those same <em> I wanted to share it with you... but I needed not to, </em> in his hand.</p>
<p>It’s this nearly poetic moment between them, and it stretches into the night. Danny studying photos, getting lost in pixels of snow and ice and sand and rock. Stark silhouettes of carvings set against pale blue skies. Soft outlines of figures, draped in silk and cotton and color. Fruits he’s never heard of, flowers he couldn’t name. Places he’d never find on a map. People whose names wouldn’t stick in his ear. Steve reacts every so often. Presses his leg more firmly against Danny, slaps the side of his foot with a laugh. Lowers the phone, smiles. Looks sad. Looks hopeful. <em> Understanding. </em> It’s easier, Danny knows, reading it all at once. Having the through line laid out more clearly than it feels living through it. Living it feels a bit like chaos. But in the reading, when it’s done, there’s coherence that never showed in the happening. That’s often how life goes.</p>
<p>Steve’s stopped reading, Danny realizes, at some point. He’s got lost in an album that’s mostly waterfalls. Some in verdant mountain meadows, some in places there shouldn't even be water. He closes the app. Sets the phone down at the edge of the sofa. Steve sets Danny’s phone on the table. Neither handing theirs back, which feels symbolic. He pulls his legs from Danny’s reach, reaches out, pulls Danny toward him.</p>
<p>“Thank you,” Steve whispers, nearly to his lips. “Thank you for sharing that with me,” and he kisses him.</p>
<p>And it’s not like their kiss before wasn’t fabulous. Not like it wasn’t its own language, its own conversation, its own communication of things that will never be said. But this kiss is something else entirely. It’s a novel, a film, a journal and a voyage. It’s a coming home, and a never having left. It’s an ending, a beginning, it’s the only thing that means anything. And it’s just beautifully void of any meaning but <em>now. </em></p>
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